When I was growing up, my girlfriends and I had a checklist of what we wanted our perfect man to be. We'd measure and evaluate each boyfriend against that list to see how they matched up.

We wanted our guy to be cute, tall and who participated in a cool co-curricular activity. Coming from a good school wouldn't hurt, either.

Of course, none of us managed to get that guy as it was probably an unrealistic, and, in retrospect, frivolous set of criteria.

The guys we dated all fell short of at least one or two standards. But we still went out with them anyway, because we could forgive bad dress sense as long as the guy had a cute smile and a voice that made us swoon.

Now that we are a bit older - and perhaps a bit wiser - we have adjusted our set of requirements to more practical ones. These include being committed, being able to hold a good conversation, being financially stable and sharing similar values.

This set of criteria is no less difficult to fulfil than my teenage one. But this time, it is non-bargainable.

Sure, if people 'moderate' - which is really to lower - their expectations of their partners, MCYS' plan to get more couples dating, and eventually, to marry, would work.

But perhaps doing so would make the relationships poorer for it.

At first, it might seem easy to compromise or overlook certain things. But in the long run, lowered expectations will come back to pose problems and create resentment.

When one or both parties settle for less, it is not really an acceptance of the perceived flaws of the other. It is merely a temporary compromise. One or both parties may still harbour hopes to fulfil that particular want and this creates a perfect set-up for discontentment.

With time, when they realise that nothing is going to change, the parties get disgruntled and are more likely to bolt.

If the MCYS campaign succeeds, marriage rates may well increase, but I'm less optimistic that couples will stay together. This leads to other social problems such as broken families, insecure children and a cynical approach to love.

Arguably, couples who see in each other their perfect Mr or Ms Right are also up against such threats. Yet, I feel they are better equipped to weather such storms, because there is no residual resentment from having to compromise or bury certain hopes.

Seeing some of my friends who, like me, are in their early 20s, go through their relationships has made me realise the importance of sticking to my ideals.

A good friend recently pulled out from a long, loving and committed relationship. It was a difficult decision for her - but one I presume was a long time in the making. She left him because he could not quit smoking, despite repeated promises and vows to try.

Right from the outset, she knew it was a habit she could not live with. But she had thought she would be able to change him.

She did not succeed. Four years and many promises later, it was goodbye.

One does not have to be bratty and unrealistic - learning to compromise is a good thing - but not when it comes to the really important things. The make-or-break criteria, in other words.

Often, when people settle for less, they think to themselves, this is as good as I can get, and shudder at the thought of losing hold of what they see as a safety net.

But when a relationship becomes that - a safety net - it does not serve its full purpose to be enriching or one that helps both parties grow.

Singles should not be afraid of holding out or waiting for the right one to come along. Good partners aren't in short supply, if we only bother to look around.

My friends who once feared that they would not find a better guy than the one they had previously, are now in stronger and more fulfilling relationships. This, after they dared to stick to their ideals in their search for a partner.

It might take a while, but I believe it is worth the wait.

When it comes to finding a partner, there is no such thing as the right time, only the right one.

The blogger in question, Brad Lau, who runs a food blog called ladyironchef, had informed the management on Friday that he would be coming down to review the Sunday Brunch promotion.

On the day itself, he and his partner came down at about 130pm, followed by his two other companions, each of whom came down half an hour apart.

According to Private Affairs' operations director Ross Valentine, the four of them had brunch until 430pm, even when the restaurant's official brunch hours was from 1130 am to 330pm. Brad and his partner also enjoyed two glasses of champagne each.

When presented with the final bill of $435, the blogger initially refused to pay and repeatedly told the restaurant's chef, "I never pay for food in any restaurant."

The restaurant eventually offered to waive off the cost of the meal for him and his partner as well as the cost of the champagne out of goodwill, thus lowering the bill to $159.

Still upset but finally relenting to pay, the blogger then threw his credit card onto the bar counter in front of the cashier before storming out.

Valentine told Yahoo! Singapore, "This blogger looked very aggressive and was quite arrogant. The fact that he also walked in with his friends at staggered timings created quite a bit of problems for my chef de cuisine, who has to prepare and present his food at just the right times."

"We decided to waive off the meal and champagne cost for him and his partner out of goodwill. But when we asked him when the review of the meal would be coming out, he said he was not obliged to write anything if the food wasn't good enough," he added.

Yahoo! Singapore emailed Brad Lau for his reaction but he has yet to a reply.

The incident, however, has enraged the local food blogging community.

Glenn Lee, who runs popular food blog Hungryepicurean.com since late last year, posted an open letter criticising the blogger's behaviour for "tarnishing the good name of the community."

Lee, 22, told Yahoo! Singapore, "We are food bloggers and I'm pretty sure the intentions of all of us in the community is to share the love that we have for food and writing."

"But what this certain blogger has done is highly detrimental to the integrity of the community as a whole and I felt the need to stand up for what I strongly believe in," he said.

Kaelyn Ong, 22, who posted an entry entitled "STOP asking for free food" on her food blog, My Food Sirens II, also expressed her disgust.

"I'm surprised. It's beyond my understanding how someone can actually request for a free meal on the house just because he's a food blogger," she told Yahoo! Singapore.

"Anyone can be a food blogger these days, all it takes is a camera and a blog... does that mean restaurants have to sponsor everyone for their meals?" she added.

She also apologised to restaurants on behalf of the food blogging community and said "not all of us are such bad eggs".

Cheryl Chia, who has a food and baking blog, cocoabutterscotch, was also appalled.

"I find it shameful. Demanding for free food on account of your supposed "status" as a person who blogs about food is not acceptable," the 26-year-old said.

Renowned food expert KF Seetoh, who runs the popular makansutra.com, said the blogger in question lost his integrity by refusing to pay.

"The best position is to be invisible, pay for your own food. When you pay for your own food, you don't take any prisoners when you write," he said.

But what if the restaurant offers to give bloggers a free meal?

"Then I won't write about your restaurant. Even if they offer me 50% off the total bill, and if I write about it, they will take my review with a 50% pinch of salt. Some of them, after eating, they call the chef out and ask him to change this and that on the menu. Some would then say, let me do a consultancy role for you. You do what I say and I write nice things.

"My stand is, be neutral. I pay, I say and then I rate," he concluded.

At the time, you probably joked with your girlfriends about how he was a little puppy dog, always following you around, trying to do things to get you to pay attention to him. They probably teased you because they thought he had a crush on you. Given that his behavior was, admittedly, a little pathetic, you vehemently denied having any romantic feelings for him, and buttressed your position by claiming that you were "just friends." Besides, he totally wasn't your type. I mean, he was a little too short, or too bald, or too fat, or too poor, or didn't know how to dress himself, or basically be or do any of the things that your tall, good-looking, fit, rich, stylish boyfriend at the time pulled off with such ease.

Eventually, your Platonic buddy drifted away, as your relationship with the boyfriend got more serious and spending time with this other guy was, admittedly, a little weird, if you werent dating him. More time passed, and the boyfriend eventually cheated on you, or became boring, or you realized that the things that attracted you to him weren't the kinds of things that make for a good, long-term relationship. So, now, you're single again, and after having tried the bar scene for several months having only encountered players and douche bags, you wonder, "What happened to all the nice guys?"

Well, once again, you did.

You ignored the nice guy. You used him for emotional intimacy without reciprocating, in kind, with physical intimacy. You laughed at his consideration and resented his devotion. You valued the aloof boyfriend more than the attentive "just-a-" friend. Eventually, he took the hint and moved on with his life. He probably came to realize, one day, that women aren't really attracted to guys who hold doors open; or make dinners just because; or buy you a Christmas gift that you mentioned, in passing, that you really wanted five months ago; or listen when you're upset; or hold you when you cry. He came to realize that, if he wanted a woman like you, he'd have to act more like the boyfriend that you had. He probably cleaned up his look, started making some money, and generally acted like more of an asshole than he ever wanted to be.

Fact is, now, he's probably getting laid, and in a way, your ultimate rejection of him is to thank for that. And I'm sorry that it took the complete absence of "nice guys" in your life for you to realize that you missed them and wanted them. Most women will only have a handful of nice guys stumble into their lives, if that.

So, if you're looking for a nice guy, here's what you do:

1.) Build a time machine.
2.) Go back a few years and pull your head out of your ass.
3.) Take a look at what's right in front of you and grab ahold of it.

I suppose the other possibility is that you STILL don't really want a nice guy, but you feel the social pressure to at least appear to have matured beyond your infantile taste in men. In which case, you might be in luck, because the nice guy you claim to want has, in reality, shed his nice guy mantle and is out there looking to unleash his cynicism and resentment onto someone just like you.

If you were five years younger.

So, please: either stop misrepresenting what you want, or own up to the fact that you've ****ed yourself over. You're getting older, after all. It's time to excise the bull**** and deal with reality. You didn't want a nice guy then, and he certainly doesn't ****ing want you, now.

Sincerely,

A Recovering Nice Guy

At issue is Dalvik, the unique, Java-based runtime at the heart of Google's Android smartphone OS. Oracle, which gained stewardship of the Java platform when it bought Sun Microsystems in 2009, claims Dalvik knowingly, willfully, and deliberately infringes on Java intellectual property. According to a complaint filed with the U.S. District Court in San Francisco last week, Oracle is seeking a halt to any further Android development, destruction of all infringing Android software, and for Google to pay damages, both actual and statutory.

Bloggers, pundits, and developers wasted no time decrying the suit. Farata Systems' Anatole Tartakovsky wrote, "Oracle managers are clearly out of their minds." PC World's Tony Bradley described Oracle as a patent troll, while others made unflattering comparisons to the SCO Group. InfoWorld's own editor in chief, Eric Knorr, compared Oracle to Darth Vader and to Batman's nemesis the Joker in the same column.

Such knee-jerk reactions are misguided. Google is no Luke Skywalker, and its handling of Java has been questionable at best. To suggest that Oracle is being heavy-handed ignores the larger truth, which is that in recent years Sun's governance of Java has been meek and ineffective. In the absence of strong leadership, the Java community has been saddled with a slow and burdensome development process that has left the future of the platform in serious doubt. The complaint against Google is proof that Oracle aims to change all that — and it could be just what the Java community needed.

Java in name only

Ironically, few companies have been as outspoken on the issue of Sun's failed leadership as Google. Speaking at the Red Hat Middleware 2020 virtual conference in April, Google chief Java architect Josh Bloch described the platform as "rudderless" and called on Oracle to take a lead role in steering its future direction. "Technical and licensing disputes over the last few years have been highly detrimental. They've sapped the energy of the community and caused plenty of bad press," Bloch said.

But talk is cheap. In practice, rather than wait for Oracle, Google has forged ahead with its own plans for Java. The result is Android, a platform that is Java in name only. The Dalvik virtual machine doesn't even execute Java bytecode; rather, Java class files must be recompiled into Google's own .dex format before they will run. And the Android development platform is neither Java SE nor Java ME, but a hodgepodge of classes drawn from stock Java, the Apache Foundation, and Google's own contributions.

This was no accident. In a blog post, Java creator James Gosling recalls Sun's early talks with Google and how the search giant was more interested in "disrupting Apple's trajectory" with Android than in upholding Java's core principle of interoperability — despite Sun's strong objections. How would Sun benefit from Android? It wouldn't: "Google did have a financial model that benefited themselves," Gosling writes, noting "they weren't about to share."

Nor is this the only example of Google's disregard for accepted Java standards. In 2009 Simon Phipps, Sun's then-chief open source officer, criticized Google for not supporting the full set of Java core classes in its App Engine cloud computing platform. "Creating subsets of the core classes in the Java platform was forbidden for a really good reason," Phipps wrote in a blog post, "and it's wanton and irresponsible to casually flaunt the rules."

Similarly, the Google Web Toolkit (GWT) is advertised as a tool to allow developers to write client-side Web applications in Java and deploy them as JavaScript, but Google itself admits GWT supports only "most of the core Java language syntax" and "a small subset" of the standard Java classes. It seems Google's fondness for Java extends only to its popularity as a language, not its cohesiveness as a platform.

Oracle's case against Google

But if the goal of creating Java was simply to invent a new language, Sun would never have bothered. Java borrowed much of its syntax from C, C++, and elsewhere. What made it new — and important — was the JVM, with its sandbox security model and its "write once, run anywhere" promise. Coupled with the Java class libraries, the JVM made Java a unique platform that freed developers from dependence on the underlying operating system. While Java has fallen short of its loftiest goals in various ways over the years, Sun has remained constant in its efforts to preserve that platform as a consistent, unified whole.

The greatest challenge to those efforts came in the late 1990s, when Microsoft tried to splinter the Java community by offering a Windows-only version of the language. Sun took the issue to the courts, arguing that Microsoft's implementation violated the Java license agreement. When the dust finally cleared in 2001, Microsoft had agreed to scupper its Java work and pay Sun $20 million in damages.

"Now if Microsoft wants to use Java, they will have to use the same Java everyone else does," Sun vice president Rich Green said at the time. Should not Google be held to the same standard? Oracle thinks so, and like Sun of old, it has chosen a legal remedy.

Java's licensing is more complex now that it's open source, which might explain why Oracle favored the patent route in its complaint against Google. Open source luminary Bruce Perens points out that the Java Language Specification includes language granting Java implementers free license to Sun's patents, but that doesn't apply here. That license is only valid for complete implementations of Java and its required packages, "without subsetting or supersetting," which the Android implementation clearly is not.

Oracle's complaint also mentions copyrights, but here the details are scant. Java and Android are both open source, but although Java uses the GPL, Google favors the more business-friendly Apache license. If Google included verbatim Java source in its code base, that license discrepancy could be sufficient grounds to establish infringement.

What happens next?

Google claims Oracle's actions are "an attack on the Java community," but that would only be true if Google were promoting Java. To the extent that Android and the Dalvik VM are a divergent implementation that flouts the established Java standards, however, Oracle is right in describing Android as a competitor to pure Java. And as the owner of the Java intellectual property, Oracle has the right — and, perhaps, the responsibility — to defend the platform against such a competitor.

But let's not kid ourselves. The comparison to Darth Vader is hyperbole, but nobody ever accused Oracle of being a white knight, and it's certainly not acting out of selfless motives here. At the end of the day, this is all about the money. With Android now a well-established platform, Google can little afford a protracted legal battle. Oracle expects Google to settle, and the end result will be a Java coffee-cup logo on every Android smartphone and a nice, new revenue stream for Oracle. What's more, the suit will further cement the idea that the path to Java lies through Oracle, and Java implementers avoid that path to their peril.

Still, is that so terrible? The Java community needs a leader. Sun's attempt to push Java governance into the loving arms of the community has proven to be like so many other ideas that came out of that failed company: academically sound, diplomatically prudent, but ultimately unworkable. Google's Bloch was right in calling for Oracle to take a firm hand on the reins. Maybe he should have been more careful what he wished for.

Mind you, a legal victory for Oracle is not assured. The specific patents named in its complaint have raised many eyebrows and much skepticism.

There's time yet for Google to dodge this bullet — and the easiest way might be to dodge Java itself. So don't be surprised to hear that a future iteration of Android will be the first platform based on Google Go.

The Singaporean, who is consulting a top local law firm about possible legal action against the casino, claimed that the casino at no time performed any background checks on his credit-worthiness or his financial capacity. He had simply filled in an application form, deposited $100,000 and handed over a signed blank cheque, he claimed.

Subsequently, in April, the casino increased his credit line to $2 million, he told his lawyers. In his 50s, the businessman is a managing director of a multi-million-dollar company.

Over the weeks, he reportedly won or lost several hundred thousand dollars each time he visited the casino, with his losses running as high as $6 million in the course of a single session. To draw on his credit line, he said, he signed a form and was given the requisite amount of chips.

In early June, he made his biggest loss of $18 million yet in one session. Two days later, he went back to the casino and recouped some $3.7 million - but then two days after, he lost a further $11 million.

At one point during this third session when his losses crossed the $4-million mark, so the businessman claimed, his girlfriend started crying and pleaded with one of RWS' senior officers to stop providing him with more chips on credit.

The same officer, he claimed, had repeatedly assured him over the course of the gambling sessions that the casino was prepared to extend him further credit, even though his limit had long since been exceeded.

Of his $26.3 million loss, the businessman repaid $10 million almost immediately.

The businessman claims to have then met with RWS chief executive Tan Yee Teck, who offered him a "rolling figure" - which amounts to a discount - of $3.3 million.

According to the legal documents, dated July 22, the gambler owed RWS some $13 million at that point in time. It is unknown if the debt has since been settled.

When contacted, an RWS spokesperson said the group does not comment on its customers.

The businessman's lawyers have advised him to explore if an amicable resolution can be reached with the casino. But they also think he may have a case of negligence, breach of contract or breach of statutory duty against the casino.

Under the Casino Control (Credit) Regulations, an operator who enters into a credit agreement with a patron should, apart from specifying a credit limit, develop and implement criteria to assess the patron's creditworthiness. The operator must also have approval procedures for any increase in the credit limit.

In the lawyers' view, by substantially exceeding their client's earlier limits - by more than 60 times the original limit of $500,000, and 15 times the April limit of $2 million within a few hours to enable him to continue gambling "RWS had encouraged irresponsible gambling and had breached the duty of care owed to" the businessman.

RWS' conduct of continuing to pile on credit effectively rendered the concept of a credit limit meaningless, the lawyers argued. This was more so as the person in question was not in the proper frame of mind to decide on the increases, they said.

In other countries, there have been several instances of patrons suing casinos for their losses, cases which the courts have dismissed. Courts in other jurisdictions have noted among other things, that the casino was not bound to protect a gambler from his desire to wager his wealth.

Despite this, the Senior Counsel from the local law firm recommended writing to RWS. "In the letter, the issues concerning RWS' failure to promote responsible gambling ... can be raised. Hopefully, this may encourage RWS to offer a haircut that would be acceptable to you ..." he wrote.

Genting Singapore's turned in a sterling net profit of $397 million for the quarter ended June 30, compared to a loss of $50.7 million a year ago. Revenues rose to $979 million from $120 million a year ago.

According to DMG Research, at the current rate, Singapore is already the second largest casino market in Asia after Macau, and could overtake the Las Vegas strip as the second largest casino market in the world after Macau in the next two to three years. The firm estimates that the two casinos here rake in over $16 million a day.

What else is wrong?

To me, Mark Hurd's alleged improprieties just form the slashing tip of a massive iceberg. If anything, this scandal forced a few of the company's other shortcomings back into the light.

• The company is under investigation by government arms here and in Germany over alleged attempts to land contracts in Russia by bribing the right people. The amounts on the table are small by HP standards, but this shouldn't even have been an issue to begin with. Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) may bend the limits of ethical business from time to time, but this is a clean break.
• While HP now has plenty of money in the bank, the company is bankrupt in the innovation department. The annual R&D budget has declined under Hurd and his predecessor Carly Fiorina: When Fiorina took the helm, HP spent 5.8% of its annual revenue on research and development, which is the lifeblood of any self-respecting technology business. Hurd took over at a 4% R&D ratio, but at least Fiorina increased the dollar amounts spent on R&D. Now it's a paltry 2.3% — and a lower total budget. HP is doing the lobster walk.
• Insiders complain loudly about low morale as the old "HP way" has evaporated over the years. There's no budget for important projects, cost-cutting in all the wrong places, and a veritable exodus of top talent. When HP bought Palm this spring, I thought it was a great deal — until the brains that made Palm a compelling buy started jumping ship. HP isn't exactly destroying a legend here, but it also isn't getting what it paid for.

Who's really at fault?

The list goes on, but those are the top complaints. In the end, it all comes back to a decade of lacking leadership. Hurd is gone, but the damage is already done, and I blame the board of directors. Actually, scratch that — I blame Mark Hurd for the spineless board of directors he created.

Most of HP's board members joined the steering committee under Hurd, who served as chairman of the board in addition to his CEO duties. You have to assume that the chairman has a significant say in who does and doesn't get one of those cherished board seats.

The entire board now consists of members appointed under either Hurd or Fiorina, two leaders whose sense of grand strategy leaves a lot to be desired. The fact that Hurd's supposed buddies then turned on him unanimously says something about his ability to pick friends, as well. Oh, and then they turned around and gave the supposed miscreant a generous parting gift. I don't think we're talking about a great judge of character here.

In other words, the board is a legacy of two failed empires — the first in a business sense and the second in moral code. What are the chances that their appointee for the vacant CEO and chairman positions will be ready and able to fix the many cracks that have formed in HP's armor over the last decade? Not good. If I were a shareholder, I'd be calling for a brand-new board. And then the new crew gets to pick a new CEO.

Who can fix it?

So whoever gets the thankless job of running Hewlett-Packard next is facing a monumental task:

• Repair the damage inflicted on HP's culture by two failed leaders.
• Inject a strategic vision into a lifeless hulk of too many moving parts.
• Inspire top talent to flock to HP again after many years of the opposite effect.
• Do all of this under a low enough budget to keep shareholders from running elsewhere and messing the whole plan up.

This sinking ship may be beyond repair. It would take a leader with truly epic credentials to get HP out of this mess, like John Chambers of Cisco Systems (Nasdaq: CSCO), Sam Palmisano from IBM (NYSE: IBM), or maybe Oracle (Nasdaq: ORCL) CEO Larry Ellison. But all of these people already have great jobs with companies they love, and they won't come to HP's rescue.

The best HP can hope for is some relatively unknown lower-level executive with grand career ambitions or another technology leader's unwanted leftovers. If Steve Jobs isn't going anywhere, perhaps Tim Cook would leave Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) for a bigger job at a paradoxically smaller company. Or perhaps a merger with EMC (NYSE: EMC) would let HP raid the storage expert's rich locker of quality leadership.

Empires fall all the time. Barring a miracle, I think HP is the next one in line.

The PAP has spared no expenses in ensuring the success of the YOG including launching a public campaign to publicize the event in the HDB heartlands and designating YOG lanes to facilitate the travel of YOG delegates.

In contrast, it is unable or unwilling to do anything to prevent the spate of recent flooding which have inconvenienced ordinary Singaporeans.

PAP strongman Lee Kuan Yew even proclaimed that the floods were an "act of God" and no amount of engineering can prevent them. However, the YOG Committee is quick to draft up a contingency plan to ensure that the event is not disrupted by a flash flood, much to the chagrin of Singaporeans.

Despite the media frenzy, the response from Singaporeans on the ground has been lukewarm so far, prompting a panicky Minister of Community, Youth and Sports Dr Vivian Balakrishnan to urge Singaporeans to "rally" around it.

Many Singaporeans view the event as another vain attempt by the PAP to burnish its international image and want nothing to do with it, but are unable to express their sentiment explicitly out of fear of being "fixed' by the repressive regime.

A friend in his 20s came to this conclusion after confiding in me that he had recently met a woman who is more attractive than his wife, and so occupies his thoughts more often than his wife does.

'If only I had met her before I got married,' he said wistfully.

But I think even if the love of one's life appears when one is single, one may not be in the right frame of mind to recognise him or her as such.

And then love passes by.

Life is littered with near misses and lost opportunities.

I attended my ex-boyfriend's wedding last month, which triggered many memories.

We met five years ago when I was 23 and he 31. It was love at first sight.

He had an established career, was down-to-earth and steadfastly religious.

I was then working as an air stewardess and my head was - literally and metaphorically - in the clouds.

I was also - well, let's put it this way - not religious.

Despite our differences, we were soulmates. We had the same quirky sense of humour and shared long, intense overnight conversations.

But human nature is perverse. When someone is excessively nice to us, we start taking things for granted, instead of appreciating them even more.

My ex sent me to the airport, fixed my PC, reminded me to take health supplements - and go to church.

He had everything I could want in a husband - except that I was not looking for one. A boyfriend was all I could cope with then.

I loved fast cars, danced wildly at Zouk and took off on shopping holidays at a whim. My life revolved around I, me and myself.

In the six months that we were together, he popped the question several times and talked ad nauseam about having children. He wanted us to enrol for a Christian marriage preparation course.

Yes, I did often fantasise about a Vera Wang wedding gown, but I was at that stage of my life when I was more interested in Guess than Baby Guess.

And where - dare I admit it? - I still wanted to meet other men.

So I was a 23-year-old with the emotional maturity of a 13-year-old. Responsibility? Wasn't that for adults?

In short, I met Mr Right at the wrong time.

The more he talked about marriage and religion, the more I felt pressured and the more pressured I felt, the more irritable I became.

I was too impatient to compromise. Every trivial matter blew up as a big deal. My mood obliterated the good in our relationship and reached a point where I just wanted out.

He was heartbroken; I was sad but relieved. He still called me regularly, beseeching me to change my mind.

The calls stopped finally after a year. Now and then, we say 'Hi' via e-mail.

I had a few painful relationships after that. Served me right, as those rude wake-up calls were necessary for me to realise the meaninglessness of my hedonistic high life.

I missed the tenderness of my ex and began having second thoughts.

Perhaps I also felt more urgency to find someone marriageable before my biological clock reached zero hour. It dawned on me that I am not a pixie like Peter Pan who can flit around forever. One day, I'd wake up sick and alone when my fair weather friends flit away.

But I was too proud and too unsure of my ex's reaction to call him until last year.

The first thing he told me excitedly was that he had found The One. My heart tumbled to my feet. So, that's Fate.

If only I could turn back time. If only I had met him later. If only... what feeble words.

These days, I am more circumspect. I have come to terms with my loss. There is nothing I can do about timing, but I can do everything about my choices.

Sometimes, when the nights get lonely, I toy with the idea of marrying a platonic friend of mine, who often assures me earnestly that, if the worst comes to the worst, he'd be willing to marry me.

But I always dismiss that. I have already made one mistake. I should not make another by settling for second best merely for the sake of getting hitched - only to regret it soon after, as the guy who confided in me did.

Hopefully, the best is not over but yet to be.

How many times has Mr/Ms Right come into your life, but at the wrong time?

At the Tessarina Condo in Bukit Timah area, waters rose to knee-high, flooding the basement carpark. Some cars were almost submerged in water, prompting frantic residents to move them out to drier grounds.

Straitstimes.com reader Jerry Chan said the flooding was 'chaotic' and it was the third time in seven months, not 'once in 50 years as suggested'.

Singapore Civil Defence Force personnel also evacuated 60 people in 20 different places, including passengers who were stuck in an SBS bus along Upper Thomson Road.

There were also reports of a fallen tree along Dorset Road, which was causing traffic congestion.

Along Upper Thomson Road, shops were reported to be badly damaged, with huge fridges overturned and smashed.

There were also reports of a flooded carpark at the Delfi Orchard, which was hit by the worst flooding in 26 years in June just less than a month ago.

Parts of Kallang and Tanjong Katong were also flooded.

Ms Grace Loh, a resident of Tanjong Katong, sent pictures of her flooded home, which she called a 'shocking sight'.

Said Ms Loh: 'The flood today seems worse than what I experienced as a child in the 1980s!'

Tickets - all general admission - are being sold to the public at $10 for the preliminary rounds and $30 for the final medal rounds.

MOE's bulk-buying of tickets has given a boost to overall YOG ticket sales, which, to date, have been sluggish.

Out of an overall 320,000 tickets put up for sale, only about 20,000 tickets have been taken up by the public since the launch on March 31.

Explaining the purchase, MOE's director for education programmes Sum Chee Wah said it had been done to ensure that students here have the opportunity to support local and foreign athletes while enjoying the spirit of sports competition.

All schools will be allotted tickets and, as far as possible, be matched to watch the preliminary competitions that involve their twinned National Olympic Committees (NOC).

This twinning initiative, known as Friends@YOG, was introduced in November 2008 and pairs Singapore schools with schools from the home countries of each of the 204 other participating NOCs.

Sixty per cent of ticket costs will be borne by MOE while the remainder will be paid by the schools.

It is, however, up to the schools to decide the ultimate cost borne by students, it added.

The ministry has been a huge supporter over the months in the lead-up to the games. For example, it rescheduled the school sports calendar this year so that most competitions in the National Schools Games will be held in the first half of the year.

This is to allow student athletes here more time to support and enjoy the YOG.

The ministry also said schools may make adjustments to school-based assessments or curriculum time so that they will not be held during the games.

One school, Qifa Primary in West Coast, will not be postponing classes but it will help those who attend the games to catch up with lessons.

Principal Debra Saw said that the school is also buying an extra 70 tickets - on top of those allotted by MOE - for the volleyball and basketball competitions.

While volleyball is the school's niche sport, Ms Saw said that the school also wants to develop its basketball team and feels that the exposure of watching the sport will be useful.

North Vista Secondary in Sengkang, however, will be postponing and rescheduling lessons and co-curricular activities if necessary for students to attend the YOG.

Apart from the tickets MOE will be allotting to the school, North Vista also plans to purchase another 1,500 tickets.

This is to ensure that every student and staff member has the opportunity to witness at least one YOG competition, said school principal Lim Lai Chuan.

Of the 158 competition sessions, tickets to the diving, fencing, handball and swimming events are no longer available, according to the Youth Olympic Games organising committee.

Also being snapped up are tickets to the athletics and gymnastics competitions. There are also less than 100 tickets available for all sessions of basketball, equestrian, modern pentathlon, shooting and taekwondo.

Tickets to the Youth Olympic Games closing ceremony went on public sale on Monday.

A proportion of tickets which were not transacted following the opening and closing ceremony ticket balloting exercise have been put up for public sale. This allows people who did not participate in, or were not familiar with, the balloting exercise an opportunity to buy tickets.